In my last post, I listed sources of never-ending tasks that we are forced to endure at work. In this post, I would like to share ways to reduce the flow of never-ending tasks or, at least slow them down.
First, how would it feel if you were not constantly deluged with more tasks that kept you from doing your primary job?
Here is a list of ways to reduce the task onslaught (or at least think about it differently) that you can consider for yourself or your team:
- Too often the time needed for an employee to complete their job is vague or not well understood so we are okay with piling more on. We also have a culture that obligates us to take on these added tasks.
- Define the critical work for your job and make non-critical work a low priority. This is also the first step to filtering out the work that you will not do.
- Calculate the resources required to accomplish the critical work. If you don’t have enough resources to do the extra work then don’t do it. We need to stop trying to wedge in more tasks.
- If you believe that there are certain noncritical tasks (such as long-term process improvement) that should be worked on then set a hard limit to the ones you will work on.
- Empower your team to say “no” based on critical/non-critical work
- Not all tasks have to be done. We have all seen how some tasks seem to go away when the requestor realizes you cannot get to them.
- Spread out your email cadence. If you need to reply to something then do it at the end of the day so you do not have to deal with the responses that day. Taming the email hydra.
- Stop training others that you will take anything that is asked. Be willing to push back with reasons related to completing the critical work and burning out yourself or your team.
These are items that I am implementing with my team to make their work more tolerable. Consider these thoughts when you feel overwhelmed or when your team seems to be struggling with everything asked of them.